Brad Thor - Path Of The Assassin

When the guards locked Harvath back in his room, he knew he’d been blessed with the rarest of opportunities-a second chance. He went over the room again inch by inch, searching for anything he could use as a weapon. Out of frustration, he walked into the bathroom for the third time, and that’s when inspiration struck.

It took several hours of digging at the grout with his fingernails, but Harvath finally was able to loosen one of the large square tiles and then remove it from the wall. He scored the back of it as best he could by rubbing the tile continuously across one of the metal flanges used to bolt his bed to the floor. Once the tile was scored, he placed the guide cut over the edge of the bed frame and punched down on the tile with his blanket-wrapped fist.

The tile broke perfectly, leaving a jagged, sharp edge. Harvath worked the bottom of the tile against the metal flange a little longer, fashioning a makeshift handle, which he then wrapped tightly with strips of cloth torn from his sheets.

He took a moment to sit back on his mattress and admire his handiwork. It wasn’t pretty, but by prison-shiv standards, he had created quite a formidable weapon. Judging from the night sky outside his window, there were only a few more hours until daylight. Harvath didn’t even want to begin to imagine what morning and Hashim Nidal might have in store for them.

A loose plan had begun forming in his mind. He tried to quiet all of the competing thoughts whirling in his head and focus on how he was going to get them out of this. If anything happened to Meg Cassidy, he’d never be able to forgive himself. She had suffered more than enough already.

A loud explosion broke Harvath’s meditation and drew him across the room to the window. It was soon followed by another explosion and then another. They all sounded as if they were coming from the other side of the compound.

At first, Harvath wondered if the terrorists were doing some sort of oddball nighttime training, but discarded that idea when the lights dipped twice and then went out. The room was completely black, except for the faint glow of moonlight streaming in through the window. Harvath heard a commotion in the hallway and crossed from the window to that side of the room in three quick strides.

He pressed his ear up against the door and heard what sounded like retreating footsteps. He tried the handle of his door, but it was still locked from the outside. He couldn’t be sure if Morrell had arrived to rescue them, but something was definitely happening.

He kept his ear against the door for several more minutes, but heard nothing. The explosions continued outside, but at wider intervals. They seemed to be coming from different directions.

With his shiv at the ready, Harvath finalized his plan. It wasn’t the best one he’d ever conceived, but he figured trying it was a lot better than waiting for Hashim and his men to come take him down to the dungeon torture chamber that he knew in his bones this place possessed. If Morrell was somewhere outside, he’d need all the help he could get.

Scot began pounding on his door and calling out for the guard. He would keep the shiv hidden underneath his shirt until he could get close enough to one of the men and take him out. He would then try and take out the second guard and free Meg Cassidy. He calculated the odds and didn’t like them, but they were a whole lot better than the potential alternative. The bottom line was that Adara and Hashim Nidal were never going to let Harvath or Meg leave the compound alive.

When he stopped pounding and pressed his ear up against the door again, he heard the faint sound of footsteps. Seconds later there was the sound of the bolt on the other side being drawn. Harvath had had no idea someone was that close. The footsteps had sounded much further off. He decided he would let the guards find him doubled over and maybe they would think he was ill. If he could get at least one, if not both of them, to lower his defenses for just a moment, that would be all the time he needed. He jumped back and readied his weapon.

The door swung open and blazing flashlight beams pierced the darkness. Then they turned off. Harvath could just make out several large forms entering the room in classic buttonhook fashion. They fanned out and cleared the room and bathroom area in less than five seconds. Harvath had no idea what was happening. He was surrounded by three heavily outfitted men in tactical gear with helmets and armed with silenced Mark Eleven Mod Zero assault rifles.

“Somebody order room service?” asked one of the men, whose face was covered with a black balaclava.

Harvath recognized the voice immediately. It was Gordon Avigliano! “Where the hell have you guys been?” asked Harvath.

“Long story,” replied Avigliano. “I’ll tell you in the car. Where’s Ms. Cassidy?”

“Straight across the hall.”

Avigliano handed Harvath a silenced forty-five-caliber H amp;K Special Operations Command pistol and some extra ammunition. Mounted on the rail beneath the barrel was a SureFire tactical light complete with pressure switch. With the pressure-sensitive switch affixed to the pistol’s grip, you could activate the beam when, and only for as long, as you needed it.

“You look like shit,” said Avigliano.

Harvath wanted to say that the Nidal family health spa left a lot to be desired, but he bit his tongue. The men formed an assault column known as the Conga Line, with each operative covering a different angle with their weapons.

Avigliano drew back the bolt on Meg Cassidy’s door and cautiously pushed it open. Before he knew what was happening, Meg was flying at him with a large vase held high above her head. Since he was decked out in full tactical gear, she couldn’t tell Avigliano was one of the good guys. He tried to blind her with the beam from his flashlight, but it was too late. Meg Cassidy had already locked on.

Avigliano raised his rifle just in time. The vase shattered against it sending shards of porcelain, water, and flowers in all directions.

One of Avigliano’s teammates quickly wrestled Meg to the ground. “Ms. Cassidy, my name is DeWolfe. We’re part of the Operation Phantom team. We’re here to get you out.”

Meg struggled underneath the large man, who had taken her down and pinned her arms behind her back in the blink of an eye.

“Where’s Scot?”

“Scot?” asked DeWolfe.

“Harvath. Norseman,” said Meg as she struggled to break free of the man’s powerful grip.

Harvath came into the room and tapped DeWolfe on the shoulder. He let up on Meg. “I’m right here. Are you okay?” asked Harvath.

“Why the hell did he have to do that?” she asked as the men quickly swept the rest of the room.

“It was for your own protection.”

“My protection?”

“It’s just the safest way to do things. They didn’t want you hurting them or yourself. I would have done the same thing.”

“Thanks. I’ll remember that.”

“Can we do this later, Meg? Right now, let’s focus on getting out of here.”

“Roger that,” said Avigliano from behind Harvath. “Let’s beat feet.”

“Where’s the rest of the team?” asked Harvath as the men prepared to go back into the hall.

“This is it,” replied Avigliano.

“What do you mean, ‘this is it’?”

“We dropped in with the FAVs. Morrell instructed us to follow the truck you’d been loaded into after you got captured. Once we found out where they had taken you, we radioed back. The team was going to rendezvous with us, but Libyan soldiers are crawling all over the place. Nidal must have called them in. Morrell and the guys made it back to their FAVs, but got cut off. They couldn’t get around the Libyans to get here and help out.”